


An attempt to help a friend correct a passive moment

by mayoho



Category: A Series of Unfortunate Events - Lemony Snicket
Genre: Gen, I didn't put Mr Handler in the Snicketverse he did that himself, Not RPF, Not crack fic, So this is a story about fictional Mr Handler who is actually Mr Snicket's literary agent, The Grim Grotto
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-04
Updated: 2019-04-04
Packaged: 2020-01-04 12:20:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18343583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mayoho/pseuds/mayoho
Summary: "Perhaps you have experienced a passive moment at the shoe store, when you sat in a chair as the shoe salesperson forced your feet into a series of ugly and uncomfortable shoes, when all the while you wanted a bright red pair with strange buckles that nobody on earth was going to buy for you."-Lemony Snicket, The Grim Grotto





	An attempt to help a friend correct a passive moment

Mr. Snicket sipped his tea morosely. Mr. Snicket did everything morosely, but it seemed to Mr. Handler that his afternoon tea companion’s moroseness was more defined than just a part of the man’s general milieu. 

Mr. Handler sighed, “Mr. Snicket, if you want a pair of impractical red shoes with a strange buckle that badly—“

“Oh no, I couldn’t!”

“Your books are selling well—“

Mr. Snicket gasped. “That’s terrible, don’t remind me of that.”

Mr. Handler ignored the interruption, “—so you have the financial resources...” he trailed off as Mr. Snicket frowned.

“I simply can’t,” Mr. Snicket stood rather abruptly. They had—though in fairness, Mr. Snicket had eaten the vast majority of it—finished the tea service some time ago, though they had not quite emptied the tea pot. “I really must be going.”

Mr. Handler shook Mr. Snicket’s hand before the gentleman swept out of the tea house in something of a huff. Mr. Handler sighed and poured the remainder of the tea into his tea cup. He had been Mr. Snicket’s literary agent, personal representative, associate, and friend for quite some time now. He was well aware of Mr. Snicket’s rather tragic situation, and thus inclined to give his occasional stand-offish and rude behavior a pass, especially as the man was generally a very pleasant and engaging conversationalist and an exceptional fencer, which had come in handy on more than one occasion. 

After he finished his tea, Mr. Handler settled the check (he had never considered himself in any way good with money until he had observed Mr. Snicket’s utter disregard of it) and headed home. Quite by coincidence, he took a slightly different route then he normally would that took him past a specific shoe store with a certain pair of shoes. 

 

Mr. Handler pushed his way into his apartment to find his wife, Ms. Brown, sitting at the dinner table sketching. 

“What is that?” she asked, eyeing his box.

“I bought Mr. Snicket a pair of wildly impractical shoes.”

Ms. Brown raised her eyebrows. “You bought Mr. Snicket a pair of wildly impractical shoes. Why on earth did you do that?” 

“He seemed extraordinarily upset to not have them and refused to buy them himself. Although, now that I have the shoes, it’s become apparent to me that this is ridiculous even by Mr. Snicket’s standards for melancholy and drama. His feelings almost certainly had less to do with the shoes and more to do with living the kind of life where one might suffer a kidnapping attempt simply by visiting the wrong shoe store at the wrong time and that one may not have somewhere, such as a stable address at a location with a closet, to store an impractical pair of shoes even if one were to procure such a thing without incident.”

“Oh, sweetheart, you should have just asked him over for dinner,” Ms. Brown said, somewhat exasperatedly. 

“Yes, thank you. In hindsight, that is painfully obvious. I suppose I’ll have to return these as I can’t possibly give them to him now.”

“Unless you intend to wear them yourself.”

“No, it’s best I return them. Although the salesman was quite sinister. I don’t particularly want to go back.”

“We might as well go now. We’ll stop and telegram Mr. Snicket on the way; invite him for dinner,” Ms. Brown smiled. “You idiot.”

**Author's Note:**

> I don't remember particularly liking the Grim Grotto when I first read it, although I distinctly remember getting it from Barnes and Nobles the day it came out and subsequently reading it under my desk during class at school. I think it's one of my favorites now--it's got the most bizarre random anecdotes (like the subject of this fic and Lemony's marmoset) and the real start of the moral ambiguity of VFD and the Snicket siblings. 
> 
> That still doesn't excuse why I wrote this. I have no excuses or explanations. I have a whole pile of more reasonable things that remain half finished and I wrote this instead. 
> 
> Concrit welcome. Stylistically, this sounds a bit more like a Jane Austin novel than I intended it to, but I think it works?
> 
> (Also congratulations everyone on contributing to a Hugo award!)


End file.
